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Showing posts from 2014

Warhammer: Age of Retconning

It’s both interesting and exciting to see Games Workshop (or G-Dubz, if you’re keeping it real) venturing into new territory with their series Warhammer: The End Times , but this leaves the Beard Bunker’s Hochland campaign setting in a weird place. For anyone unfamiliar with the Warhammer setting, the last big event in its chronology was the Storm of Chaos, and we decided to set our own story immediately after it. The most recent edition of Warhammer dialled the clocks back to the years just before this event, but they never officially retconned it. That changed with the release of Warhammer: the End Times. Nagash and his top had get right up in someone's shi. Our little cul-de-sac of the Old World is now not only beyond Warhammer’s timeline, but mutually exclusive with it. For some reason, this made me feel weird. Apparently I have some deep-seated nerd phobia of doing anything that contradicts the official canon. This is pretty dumb, since said canon has been

The Hochland Gazette [Issue 2]

Almost a year ago, I wrote issue 1 of the Hochland Gazette. Mainly because I fancied a bit of a giggle. I've now written issue 2 in the wake of a particularly stupid battle between Maisey and I. You see, I accidentally won a 3,500-point game after a regiment of flagellants failed their frenzy check. Yes, really. If you want the 'authentic' medieval paper-reading experience, feel free to do so by clicking on the image above. If you're less of a masochist and/or gothic font fetishist, here is the legible version: THE HOCHLAND GAZETTE Published by Ernst Drucker & Sons of Tussenhof on 20 th Vorhexen 2255 I.C. Containing the surest news and firmest advice every Angestag & Aubentag [ Price: 4 shillings ] Fanatical cult slay zombie dragon! Gruyden village safe; Hochland’s army “on top form,” says Ludenhof.  The village of Gruyden, famed for having shrine to all the gods (old and new), has once again come under attack by the restless dead

Soopa speedy Imperial Guard paint scheme

As much as I’m not that keen on the current edition of 40K, our recent foray into Inquisitor means that my enthusiasm for the 40K mythos has crept back in, like a nervous and recently-evicted lover, scared that they’re only going to be inside the nice warm house for minutes rather than years. Part of this enthusiasm is contingent upon not being subjected to endless numbers of Spehs Mahreens. As such, I found myself contemplating the Imperial Guard (or Astra Vauxhaulius, depending on which bit of the Imperium you're from). Those of you with an elephant's memory may remember the test model . Finally, I’ve had a go at some more. Now, everyone who’s ever tried to make a Guard army will remember the slog. You need a lot of little plastic dudes. As usual, one must strike a balance between speed and quality... the speed in this case being less than two hours to paint a tank. The tracks were weathered with a light brown drybrush followed by Typhus Corrosion, because

Space pixies... evil ones.

Dark Eldar are famous for many things: spikes, pain, spikes, topknots, spikes... the list goes on. What they are not famous for is being conducive to last-minute paint jobs. It’s all those smooth, crisp lines. Most experienced hobbyists would not, therefore, try to paint a squad of five of them and a six-man hive gang and a character model the night before they’re due to be used. To do something like that, you’d have to resemble the end of a bell. Konk, konk. I spent hours and hours on that bloody character development pack , and hours more on painting one of the agents participating in the Inq28 scenario. The other twelve models got an evening (and a good chunk of the next morning whilst waiting for everyone to arrive). The added challenge? The Dark Eldar were a secret. It’s not easy to keep a secret when you’re painting at the dining table and live with two of the people playing in the fudging scenario. Bless ’em, they did a fine job of looking the other way wh

Character Creation for Inquisitor

Aside from shooting stuff in the face with my shiny rusty new second hand ork fleet, I've primarily been preparing for a few role playing games. Specifically, I'm running a one-day Inquisitor scenario in the next few weeks. I say 'Inquisitor'... that's not technically true, in that we're not playing a narrative skirmish wargame. It's more like the 40K roleplaying game  Dark Heresy , in that the gamers are each playing an agent in the employ of an Imperial Inquisitor , but then... it's not Dark Heresy because whilst its production values and content are excellent, I find the game mechanics long-winded. Instead, we're using 20Eight (i.e. the barebones game engine I've been working on for the last year or so). I'm excited to use it in a futuristic context to see how well it holds up. We've hitherto played plenty of fantasy, and that's been great, but fantasy doesn't have guns, spaceships, and them funny-looking spehs ayliurr

Battlefork Goffic

We’re not dead! Two and a half years of weekly posting followed by almost two months of total silence... it probably seemed a bit out of sorts. And, perhaps, that’s because things were out of sorts (we all have our moments). But don't worry, this post isn’t about deep emotional stuff, it’s about orcs, and paint, and, and... spaceships. Yeah that’s right. Spaceships. Some of you will never have heard of Battlefleet Gothic , whereas some of you will, quite rightly, know it as Games Workshop’s Most Awesome Game . There may be people with other opinions, but they’re wrong. It’s been years since I played BFG properly, mainly because there ain’t that many folks who realise that it’s the best game ever, and moreover it’s bloody hard to buy something that’s been out of print for ten years. That eBay still features over 160 listings for the game in the UK, though, speaks to its longevity. Anyway my housemate Jon and I have been checking it out. Overcome with enthusiasm,

The Improbable Mission Force (part two)

'Allo again Bunker dwellers! 'Tis I with more tales of Dwarfy derring-do and covert sneakiness. In part one we met the first, and most normal, half of Dwalin's Dirty Dozen. In part two we'll meet the slightly madder half in the form of the Odd Squad: Something of a theme running through the Odd Squad is that a lot of them are criminals. Now some of you will be saying "but Jeff, when a Dwarf disgraces themselves they can't stand it and become a trollslayer". To which I reply, ah-hah! But those are the good Dwarfs, the proper Dwarfs who follow societies laws. The Dwarfs of the army book backstory are the ideal of Dwarfkind. There will always be wonky people. Monocultures are boring, if ever single Dwarf behaves in the way described in the book then they would be awfully bland. Instead I grant license for Dwarfs to be as nasty, backstabbing, thieving and generally naer-do-welling as any other race. They're just rarer. I went through the backstory

The Improbable Mission Force (Part One)

Greetings bunker dwellers! Lordy, three months have passed since I last posted here. I’ve been focusing rather on the last bits of commission stuff I was working on (before wrapping up that whole thing) rather than my own hobby. Fortunately, even in the busiest times I can find space for a dwarf, or twelve…   This motley crew are an upgrade to my Dwarf Rangers, a sort of Impossible Mission Force. Remember last time when I was talking about fun things that develop during narrative campaigns? Well Stromni’s Wanderers – the name for the Rangers in my army – have grown far beyond their battlefield role. We’ve mentioned before how we’re mostly all roleplayers as well as wargamers and thus have fun doing small, story-driven missions where we can achieve goals that don’t belong on the field of battle. When I was trying to figure out which unit would be best for covert and highly secret intelligence gathering and concealed naughtiness against my allies (ahem) enemies, one group